Compare and Contrast De-Aging with Deep-Faking Mark Hamill in The Mandalorian

The Season 2 finale of The Mandalorian blew people's minds by featuring a rather stunning appearance by Luke Skywalker, somehow looking just like he did back in 1983's Star Wars: Return of the Jedi. 

Mark Hamill himself participated in the effort, using digital de-aging effects to recapture his on-screen youth. Similar processes were used in the film Rogue One: A Star Wars Story to allow appearances from Carrie Fisher's Princess Leia and Peter Cushing's Grand Moff Tarkin.

However, you may have also heard of Deepfakes, the terrifiying new technology with an insane amount of abuse potential that basically allows an A.I. to overlay anyone's face onto anyone else's face and have it look astonishingly real. It has tons of applications in cinema, but also a lot of potential to deceive people and spread misinformation if used in the real world.

Paranoia aside, in this clip, you can try to spot the differences between the VFX used in The Mandalorian with how it would have looked with the Deepfake process. 

The Mandalorian is now streaming on Disney+.

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Andy Hunsaker has a head full of sitcom gags and nerd-genre lore, and can be followed @AndyHunsaker if you're into that sort of thing.